66TH MIFF ANNOUNCES FULL PROGRAM GURRUMUL WORLD PREMIERE AT CLOSING NIGHT JANE CAMPION, MELISSA GEORGE AND LUCA GUADAGNINO LEAD GUEST LINE-UP SALLY POTTER AND PIONEERING WOMEN RETROSPECTIVES UNVEILED MELBOURNE, 12 JULY 2017 – Celebrating its 66th year, the Melbourne International FIlm Festival (MIFF) unleashes its full program with a mammoth line-up of more than 358 films representing 68 countries, including 251 features, 88 shorts, 17 Virtual Reality experiences, 12 MIFF Talks events, 31 world premieres and 135 Australian premieres. It all happens over 18 days, spanning 13 venues across Melbourne, from 3 to 20 August 2017. “What a pleasure it is to launch this year’s Melbourne International Film Festival,” said Artistic Director Michelle Carey. “This year’s program offers audiences an amazing opportunity to explore new worlds through film – from our Pioneering Women and Sally Potter retrospectives to the return of our Virtual Reality program as well as a particularly strong line-up of special events, we can’t wait to open the doors to MIFF 2017.” After kicking-off the festival with the Opening Night Gala screening of Greg McLean’s MIFF Premiere Fund-supported JUNGLE, presented by Grey Goose Vodka, the festival will wind up with the world premiere CLOSING NIGHT screening of Paul Williams’ GURRUMUL. A profound exploration of the life and music of revered Australian artist Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu, the film uses the tools of the artist’s music – chord, melody, song – and the sounds of the land to craft an audio-first cinematic experience, offering a rare insight into a reclusive master. After the film, the audience will enjoy MIFF’s famous Closing Night party at the Festival Lounge. Joining the MIFF guest line-up are some of the world’s most exciting film talents. The festival is thrilled to welcome Jane CampIon with her much-anticipated new television series TOP OF THE LAKE: CHINA GIRL, presented by BBC First and Foxtel; Australia’s MelIssa George, starring in the MIFF Premiere Fund-supported THE BUTTERFLY TREE; Italian director Luca GuadagnIno with his acclaimed new film CALL ME BY YOUR NAME, a sensuous story of first love and the end of adolescence; and newcomer JennIfer Brea making her way to MIFF with UNREST, a feature documentary capturing her darkest moments as she is derailed by Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Further international guests include Peter MackIe Burns, the debut feature director of DAPHNE, a refreshing portrait of contemporary womanhood; Francis Lee, with his depiction of British rural life in GOD’S OWN COUNTRY; Slavko MartInov, the force behind the entertaining flockumentary PECKING ORDER; Gabe KlInger on behalf of PORTO, a film presented in Super 8, 16mm and breathtaking 35mm; director SamI Saif and cinematographer Anders Löfstedt with their music documentary THE ALLINS; Thai filmmaker Anocha SuwIchakornpong, winner of the Top Prize at the 2016 Thai National Film Association Awards for her feature BY THE TIME IT GETS DARK; and AnnIe Goldson, director of KIM DOTCOM: CAUGHT IN THE WEB, a documentary about the court case surrounding the internet’s most wanted criminal. MIFF guests also include DanIel Borgman, director of LOVING PIA, a winsome tale blurring documentary and fiction; and FlorIan HabIcht, director of SPOOKERS, a film focusing on a former psychiatric hospital that is now a haunted attraction. Following last year’s success, VIRTUAL REALITY (VR) returns to MIFF in 2017. Leading the charge is the world premiere of Lucas Taylor’s INSIDE MANUS, taking the audience behind the razor wire to meet the asylum seekers on the Manus Island detention centre. Other VR world premieres include Lester Francois’ RONE, a distinctive portrait of the Melbourne street artist; Khoa Do and Piers Mussared’s THE EXTRACTION, a work imagining a perilous journey through the post apocalypse; and ChrIstopher BaIley’s ACROSS, set in a world where two beings live in opposite cliffs – where one side is a paradise and the other a wasteland. The VR program continues with Jeff Goldblum making a cameo appearance in MIYUBI, a feature length film about a family’s relationship with its Japanese toy robot, from co-directors FélIx Lajeunesse and Paul Raphaël; George Gittoes expands upon his MIFF 2015 feature Snow Monkey, taking audiences on a VR tour to Afghanistan in the world premiere of FUN FAIR JALALABAD; and Ben SmIth’s THE HUNT FOR THE YIDAKI, the companion piece to the MIFF 2017 Premiere Fund- supported feature WESTWIND: DJALU’S LEGACY, will also receive its world premiere. Meanwhile UNREST VR, a film about Chronic Fatigue Syndrome – made by Amaury La Burthe and other key collaborators on Notes on Blindness: Into Darkness (MIFF 2016) – screens as an expansion piece to Jennifer Brea’s feature documentary, also showing at MIFF 2017. In addition to UNREST, MIFF’s much-loved DOCUMENTARIES program delivers an array of gripping real-life character studies. Catch WINNIE, Pascale Lamche’s Sundance Directing Award-winning portrait of Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, variously viewed as the wife of South Africa’s most revered leader, the mother and/or enemy of her nation and a revolutionary force in her own right; Andres VeIel’s BEUYS: ART AS A WEAPON, an extensive look at the felt-clad, hat-wearing German performance artist Joseph Beuys; and DINA, the Sundance Grand Jury Prize-winner from Dan SIckles and AntonIo SantInI that offers a heartfelt and heart-melting portrait of love in all its strangeness and wonder. The Documentaries program also takes audiences behind the closed doors of wildly diverse environments. In the remarkable debut film THE WORK, America’s most hardened criminals share their demons with the everyday public during the world’s most intense group therapy session in JaIrus McLeary and GethIn Aldous’ SXSW Grand Jury Prize-winner; Jean-Stéphane Bron’s THE PARIS OPERA is a film candidly charting the day-to-day drama during a season of upheaval for the revered company; and ROLLER DREAMS finds Australian director Kate HIckey tracking down the original stars of the Venice Beach 80s roller dancing movement to build a funky portrait of the rise and fall of the craze. MIFF’s toe-tapping MUSIC ON FILM program dances to its own beat with THE ALLINS where award- winning Danish documentarian SamI Saif turn his lens on the most outrageous musician to ever live – GG Allin – revealing the man behind the maniac behind the music; and in Kyoko MIyake’s TOKYO IDOLS, teenage girl pop stars grapple with finding fame and the creeping fixation of their male fan bases in an eye-opening look at Japanese idol culture. Musical influencers take centre stage in the Sundance Special Jury Prize-winning RUMBLE: THE INDIANS WHO ROCKED THE WORLD, where Catherine Bainbridge sets out to reinstate Native American trailblazers to their rightful place in the pop music pantheon; and Lucy Walker, director of the MIFF 2013 Best Documentary Audience Award-winner The Crash Reel, returns with BUENA VISTA SOCIAL CLUB: ADIOS, a touching farewell to the beloved son cubano musicians as they complete their final tour. A stellar line-up of homegrown talent will be showcased in AUSTRALIAN FILMS. Marking the halfway point of the festival will be the CENTREPIECE GALA world premiere screening of THREE SUMMERS, the first Australian film from comedian Ben Elton. Romantic leads Robert Sheehan and Rebecca Breeds are joined by a glittering ensemble featuring Michael Caton, Magda Szubanski, Deborah Mailman, Jacqueline McKenzie and John Waters for an of-the-moment, multi-story comedy set over three years at a fictional folk-music festival. Continuing the Australian Films showcase, DavId Wenham makes his feature directorial debut with a Before Sunrise-style romance set to the distinctive sounds of Megan Washington with ELLIPSIS, starring Emily Barclay and Benedict Samuel; MIFF offers an exclusive preview of the second series of GLITCH, a Matchbox Pictures production commissioned by ABC TV and co-produced by Netflix, set in a fictional Victorian town where deceased former residents have crawled out of their graves in the local cemetery; and in a special screening presented by the National Film and Sound Archive’s digital restoration program – NFSA RESTORES, MIFF will also present the classic rip-roaring homegrown action flick, SHAME, where an award-winning Deborra-Lee Furness – also a guest of MIFF 2017 – turns the tables on a country town’s entrenched male violence. Celebrating its 10th birthday in 2017, the MIFF PREMIERE FUND stages six world premieres (each with its director in attendance) comprising: Greg McLean’s MIFF Opening Night Film JUNGLE, starring Daniel Radcliffe; Luke Shanahan’s uniquely stylish psychological thriller RABBIT, featuring The Great Gatsby’s Adelaide Clemens playing identical twins linked by more than just DNA; MIFF guests MelIssa George and Ed Oxenbould starring alongside Ewen Leslie and Sophie Lowe in PrIscIlla Cameron’s THE BUTTERFLY TREE, a coming-of-age tale of love and loss tinged with magical realism; EddIe MartIn's HAVE YOU SEEN THE LISTERS?, an intimate account of the cost of success of Australia’s most renowned street artist, Anthony LIster (also a guest of the festival); NaIna Sen’s THE SONG KEEPERS, telling the Incredible story of a hidden musical legacy of ancient Aboriginal languages and German baroque songs that are being preserved by the Central AustralIan AborIgInal Women’s ChoIr (who will also attend the festival); and Ben Strunin’s WESTWIND: DJALU’s LEGACY, portraying the quest of Yolngu elder Djalu GurruwIwI (who will attend the festival) to preserve his songlines with a little help from global pop star Gotye. Marking the MIFF Premiere Fund’s 10-year milestone, the festival will also screen three retrospective highlights from the Fund’s early years: the 2009 MIFF Opening Night film BALIBO, written and directed by Robert Connolly and starring Oscar Isaac, Anthony LaPaglia and MIFF Ambassador Gyton Grantley; AmIel CourtIn-Wilson’s BASTARDY, a poetic and impressionistic portrait of the life of indigenous arts personality Jack Charles; and Ana KokkInos’ all-star ensemble BLESSED, which features Frances O'Connor in an AFI Award-winning performance.